In the Johnson Space Center's 8 September edition of its 8th Floor newsletter it is stated that Raffaello will be attached at the space station's Node 1 nadir port, which faces the Earth's surface.

The next major module for the ISS, Node 3, will be delivered in February 2010 and that is also to be attached to Node 1, also known as Unity.

Node 1 has six ports. Five are already in use, for the Z1 truss, the US laboratory module called Destiny, an airlock and two pressurised mating adaptors.

One of the adaptors links Unity to Russia's Zarya module while the other docks the Shuttle. Node 3, also known as Tranquility, will be docked to Node 1 and the Node 1 pressurised mating adaptor used for docking Shuttle will be attached to it instead.

Arriving in September 2010 Raffaello will take up the sixth port, which will be the nadir.